A reassessment of the causes and severity of Nepal's environmental crisis

Metz, John J.

doi:10.1016/0305-750x(91)90134-4

Cited by 76 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 36 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…However, as researchers examined more closely the causes, processes, and results of deforestation and as development projects established programs to reduce environmental degradation, it became clear that the problems were much more complicated than had been initially thought (Thompson and Warburton 1985). By the early 1980s, however, a number of scholars had begun the detailed research that has led to a growing consensus about the causes (Mahat and others 1986a,b, Ives and Messerli 1989, Metz 1991, processes (Levenson 1979, Fox 1983, 1984, Wiart 1983, Bajracharaya 1983, WyattSmith 1983, Campbell and Bhattarai 1984, Nield 1985, Mahat and others 1987a,b, Dobremez 1986, Metz 1989a, 1990b, and likely effects (Carson 1985, Byers 1987, Ramsey 1986, Hamilton 1987, Bruijnzeel and Bremer 1989 of forest conversion and degradation. This paper is a contribution to that process.…”

mentioning

confidence: 95%

Forest product use at an upper elevation village in Nepal

Metz

1994

Environmental Management

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

/ This paper describes forest product use at Chimkhola, an upper elevation village of west central Nepal. Villagers have large herds of livestock that they use to fertilize agricultural fields by holding the animals on cropland for one to several weeks prior to planting. Herds are moved sequentially from one group of fields to another until all are planted, and then families take animals into the forests. Herders, therefore, live in temporary shelters away from the homestead throughout the year, and for much of the year feed their livestock fodder cut from forest trees. By combining repeated interviews of sample households, one-time interviews with a large sample of village families, and direct measurements of forest products being used, I found that livestock maintenance consumes 74% of the hand-harvested wild biomass: 26.4% for green fodder, 32.3% for fuelwood at the herder's hut, and 13.8% for construction of the herder's hut. Fuelwood burned at the homestead is the next largest consumer, 17.6%. Villagers also use small amounts of forest materials for house construction, charcoal, agricultural implements, and bamboo for baskets and mats. The large amounts used by herders and livestock at Chimkhola mean that wild vegetation use there far exceeds the measurements made by previous reliable studies at other communities. This system of forest use is, however, degrading Chimkhola's forests and gradually converting them to shrublands.Scientific understanding of deforestation and environmental degradation in the Himalayas has experienced considerable change over the last 20 years. Eckholm's (1975Eckholm's ( , 1976) identification of Himalayan deforestation as a major world environmental problem seemed so intuitively obvious that it was widely accepted. However, as researchers examined more closely the causes, processes, and results of deforestation and as development projects established programs to reduce environmental degradation, it became clear that the problems were much more complicated than had been initially thought (Thompson and Warburton 1985). By the early 1980s, however, a number of scholars had begun the detailed research that has led to a growing consensus about the causes (Mahat and others 1986a,b, Ives and Messerli 1989, Metz 1991), processes (Levenson 1979, Fox 1983, 1984, Wiart 1983, Bajracharaya 1983, WyattSmith 1983, Campbell and Bhattarai 1984, Nield 1985, Mahat and others 1987a,b, Dobremez 1986, Metz 1989a, 1990b, and likely effects (Carson 1985, Byers 1987, Ramsey 1986, Hamilton 1987, Bruijnzeel and Bremer 1989 of forest conversion and degradation. This paper is a contribution to that process. Spe-KEY WORDS: Forest product use; Himalaya; Fuelwood; Agropastoral system; Nepal cifically, it describes in detail the types and amounts of forest products that a community in west central Nepal is using. In addition to describing results, it explains the methodology by which the data were collected. Methodology is important because earlier studies estimating per capita fuelwood consumption vari...

show abstract

mentioning

confidence: 95%

Forest product use at an upper elevation village in Nepal

Metz

1994

Environmental Management

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The powerful and wealthy only degrade the environment if there are institutional, or market, failures. Thus, there is a growing view that the poor are not necessarily the main agents responsible for resource degradation: quite often the rich play a much greater part in this process (METZ, 1991;PRAKASH, 1997;JODHA, 1998). On the other hand, SOMONATHAN (1991) argued that the poor do not have the resources, or the means, to cause environmental degradation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“The Reality from the Myth”: The poor as main agents of forest degradation: Lessons from Ashanti Region, Ghana

Peprah

Abalo

Amoako

et al. 2017

Environmental &Amp; Socio-Economic Studies

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The prevailing literature on poverty-environment links mostly presents a rather deterministic view of the nexus between poverty and the environment, revolving around the negative impact of the poor on the environment. Specifically, in Ghana, empirical evidence on the prevalence of forest degradation is sparse because the requisite data are often difficult to obtain. Using a qualitative approach, data collected through in-depth interviews with 45 randomly selected participants and 5 purposively selected key informants (Traditional Authorities) and using a thematic analysis, the poverty-environment, specifically the forest degradation nexus was verified. This cross-sectional study leads the authors to posit that poverty has a minimal negative effect on major forest degradation in Ghana. The study found that the poor were rather conscious, and future-oriented with regard to the environment, specifically forests owing to how their livelihoods and survival are directly linked to their immediate environment. The results suggest that the poverty-environment nexus could be country, or contextspecific and varies between geographical and historical contexts. By implication, the seemingly universal assertion that the poor are those who cause major deforestation in communities could be problematic. Henceforth, the study maintains that it would be a fallacy to make generalisations that poverty is the main cause of major forest degradation, since the link between poverty and the environment is very context-specific. We argued on the premise that reduction of poverty in Ghana may not lead to the reduction of forest degradation. Joint implementation of holistic poverty-environment strategies that incorporate both the poor and the rich should be adopted to curb the wanton forest degradation in Ghana.

show abstract

“…Eckholm popularized the Theory of Himalayan Degradation, highlighting the link between population growth and mountain deforestation and soil erosion in Nepal, which were presumed to cause downstream flooding in India and Bangladesh. Eckholm (1976: 77) Since the 1980s, this theory has been heavily criticized on empirical, theoretical and ideological grounds (Thompson et al, 1986;Ives and Messerli, 1989;Metz, 1991;Ives, 2004;Ives, 2012;Blaikie et al, 2002;Manandhar, 2007). Some labelled it as overly Malthusian (Ives, 2004), as a myth (Metz, 1989), and as unsupported environmental orthodoxy (Forsyth, 1996(Forsyth, , 1998.…”

Section: Emergence Of the New Himalayan Crisismentioning

confidence: 99%